Today’s Chicago Tribune has a lengthy front-page article about how the University of Illinois’ general fund subsidizes the athletic program with $920,000 in free tuition waivers for student athletes. The University plans to reduce this number to $500,000 by 2016, but that’s clearly not enough. All universities should, at a minimum, adopt a very simple…
A brilliant comment by Jon Stewart on academia (begins 5:30 into the clip): http://media.mtvnservices.com/mgid:cms:video:thedailyshow.com:400060 The Daily Show with Jon Stewart Get More: Daily Show Full Episodes,Political Humor & Satire Blog,The Daily Show on Facebook Newt Gingrich: The tenured professors who can flunk you if you are too openly conservative. Jon Stewart: …where the F- did…
In this week’s Chronicle of Higher Education, Ted Gup calls for the idea of diversity to include political ideas, and he reports mumbling “sorry” to a parent who complains that his conservative son didn’t feel comfortable speaking his ideas in class. I’m annoyed at Gup for citing ACTA’s distorted surveys as proof that conservatives face…
“The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, But in ourselves, that we are underlings.”–Julius Caesar The star system is one of the worst afflictions to hit academia, and responsible for many of academia’s current problems. Frank Donogue wrote a recent blog on academic stars that got me thinking about the topic. Academia has…
On my College Freedom blog is my essay responding to an earlier article by Peter Wood and Ashley Thorne of the NAS regarding Erskine College firing Bill Crenshaw. I also did a short interview with Bill Crenshaw. Joe Berry also has more COCAL Updates: 1. Santa Fe CC (NM) colleagues at Occupy demonstration [some great…
“Anti-Jewish Bias Claim at Columbia,” declares the headline at the National Review’s Phi Beta Cons blog. The only problem is that it’s utterly false. In January, Barnard Professor Rachel McDermott is alleged to have advised a student not to take Columbia professor Joseph Massad’s course on the Arab world because “he’s very anti-Israel,” and “You’ll…
The AAUP has issued this statement in support of the Occupy Wall Street movement: The Collective Bargaining Congress and national Council of the American Association of University Professors stand in solidarity with the Occupy Wall Street movement. Over the last several years, we have watched as those at the very top have prospered while the…
This weekend, I attended the 25th Anniversary celebration for the Campus Honors Program (CHP) at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. It led me to think about something I’ve contemplated ever since I entered the Campus Honors Program in 1987: what is the justification for an honors program? In an era of budget cuts, why…
Malcolm Kline, executive director of Accuracy in Academia, has responded to my critique yesterday of his essay listing the professors who provide “100 arguments against tenure.” Kline argues that abolishing tenure “is not tantamount to firing.” That’s absolutely true. But Kline is not making a broad argument against the existence of tenure (and there are…
The AAUP has posted a call for proposals for its Annual Conference on Higher Education, which will be held in Washington, DC, June 13 –17, 2012 at the Mayflower Renaissance: Do you have something to say about current challenges to academic freedom? Online education? Pedagogical techniques that really work? Strategies for improving working conditions or…